


Catbird

by inlovewithnight



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Wings, Gen, Team as Family, Wingfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-08
Updated: 2018-12-08
Packaged: 2019-09-13 21:36:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,242
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16900239
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inlovewithnight/pseuds/inlovewithnight
Summary: Only three guys on the Panthers have wings, which is low for a modern-day team.





	Catbird

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the [Magical Realism Multifandom Prompt Fest](https://girlmarauders.dreamwidth.org/27678.html).

Only three guys on the Panthers have wings, which is low for a modern-day team. Sure, back in the 30s or whatever, winged people weren’t allowed to play at all, but now all the best athletes are winged. Everybody knows that the body modifications that go with wings make you better at everything—stronger circulatory system, lighter but stronger bones, delicate but powerful muscular structures. There’s talk of splitting winged and non-winged competition in all sports, setting up separate Olympics, everything, but it hasn’t been done yet. 

If they do it, Aaron’s going to lose pretty much his whole team, and that will suck. Just him, Barky, and Lu, sitting in the locker room by themselves.

His wings curl and shiver, giving his anxiety away like they always do. A few feathers work free and drop to the floor, tattered at the edges. He hasn’t gotten them trimmed or hot-oiled lately, and he hasn’t felt like preening much. He’s probably going to go into molt and look awful for weeks. That’ll be the talk of Twitter. 

Huby stoops down and picks up the dropped feathers, running them between his fingers. “Ekky, what now?” 

Aaron shrugs, not looking directly at him, not letting himself stare at the tawny bits of vane and shaft in Huby’s hand. “Just stressed out. You know how it is.”

They all know how it is. This was supposed to be their year. Instead, they’re fucking up again.

“You’ve still gotta take care of yourself.” Huby shakes his head. “Barky, come here.”

“No, don’t—” He doesn’t want this to be a thing. It’s not a big deal. He’s just dumb, that’s all, dumb and stressed out. 

Barky’s already on his way across the room, and Aaron feels the familiar twinge of mirrored jealousy and relief, looking at him. Barky, the _captain_ , the role Aaron thought was guaranteed to be his, thought he was going to just walk into and live there for his whole career. Having that stress on top of everything else probably would have killed him, this year; Barky is handling it much better than he would. Weirdo Finn mental strength, or whatever. Still. Aaron feels it, every time he looks at him, and it sucks.

“What’s wrong?” Barky asks in his soft, careful voice, before he looks at the feathers in Huby’s hand. Then his own wings mantle and spread a bit before he calms them with a visible effort. You can see that he’s Finnish by culture, the way he handles his wings, and Russian by heritage just by looking at them. Broad span, the largest vanes as wide as the relaxed palm of his hand, all in a soft deep gray with a hint of blue if you look from the corner of your eye. Barky’s wings are _sick_.

“You have an oil set, don’t you?” Huby asks, and for a minute Aaron isn’t sure which of them he’s talking to. Barky is nodding, though, so he stays quiet and lets them talk. “Well, we’ll take him to your house, then, preen him up good, oil and wax. Then a fucking nap, yeah? We all need it.”

It’s weird hearing a wingless person know how to talk about it so casually. But then, Barky and Huby have been close forever, and they were both close with Jags—god, _Jags_ , his wings are legendary, blue-black and a span wider than a truck, everybody felt small and insignificant in a locker room with Jags. 

Barky is nodding some more. “Yes, of course. We’ll fix you up, Aaron. Help you relax and feel better.”

“Should I buy you dinner?” It comes our sharper than he meant, more sarcastic, but fuck. Preening is _intimate_ , it’s special, and they’re just gonna… sit down and do it like it’s no big deal. He can’t act like it _isn’t_ one. If they’re going to help him groom and take care of him, then he owes them, in like an _intimate way_.

Or at least a sarcastic, jokey, _buy you dinner first?_ kind of way.

Neither of them flinches. “Of course,” Huby says. “Postmate us something good after our nap. A four-course spread.”

“Something with fish,” Barky says, already headed back to his stall to get his keys. “I think I’m in a fish mood today.”

**

Aaron had forgotten how good it feels to be taken care of like this.

Barky’s preening kit isn’t anything fancy—handmade wooden and bone tools instead of cheap plastic, sure, but it just has regular oil and wax—but he and Huby are both really good at using it. They’re sitting cross-legged on Barky’s guest room bed, with Aaron lying face-down between them, his wings loosely spread so they can each hold one across their lap and work on it.

Huby clicks his tongue in disapproval every time he finds a broken shaft, or one that’s been half-shed but not cleared free from the new feather growth. There’s a lot of clicking, and Aaron is embarrassed, but it’s hard to really feel it when they’re both working their fingers down to the roots of the feathers and cleaning out everything dry and itchy and aggravating that he’s let build up down there.

“Get all this out,” Barky says in a low, sing-song voice. “Then we’ll paint the oil on, spread it around good, give you some time to soak it in, and seal everything up with wax. You’ll feel like a new person.”

“I’ll have to get a haircut tomorrow,” Aaron mumbles, turning his head just enough that the words aren’t muffled by the pillow. “So I match everywhere.”

Barky nods and pats him on the shoulder. “You are a little shaggy. Get cleaned up, look good, feel good, play better. It all fits together, I think.”

He feels just good enough to try for another joke. “That doesn’t explain you guys playing good with your stupid moustaches in November.”

Huby pokes him in the neck with the wooden end of a preening pick. “Hey, we were handsome for a good cause.” 

“You looked like an old-timey gangster.”

“Exactly. Handsome.” Huby and Barky are both chuckling, soft warm little sounds that Aaron wants to sink into. He closes his eyes and lets himself relax against the bed, little shivers going through his muscles as they give in. He knows his wings must be shivering, too, but the guys don’t complain. They work with him. 

He’s most of the way asleep when he hears Barky open the oil, then smells it, then feels the familiar weight of it being painted onto his flight feathers. “You want to do both sides?” Huby asks softly. “I’ll order the food and have them deliver it in maybe three hours? He’s going to sleep right through to that.”

Aaron tries to rouse himself, to protest, to insist that he can do it, but before he gets very far, he hears Barky’s soft murmur of agreement. “Yeah, do that,” he says, painting another feather, oil running down the shaft to meet Aaron’s skin under the protection of vane and down. “Be a nice time for all of us, getting rest. Taking time together.”

_Flock_ , Aaron thinks sleepily, like he does sometimes, when things are just really good and the team is clicking and he knows he’s found his place. He doesn’t always remember to feel that way, but when he does, it’s just—it’s really good, being part of it is good.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[podfic] Catbird](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18108665) by [Annapods](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Annapods/pseuds/Annapods)




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